I Became a Forest Witch Who Raises Dragons

Ariel is Kind

The place the village chief led us to was a wooden house.
Seeing that he had the key to the locked door, it was probably his own house.
The village chief, who opened the door with familiarity, soon guided us inside.

“Please sit here.”
“…Thanks.”
I was a bit reluctant to speak informally to the village chief, who was much older than me, but thinking it would be strange to start using formal speech now, I decided to stick with informal speech.

The village chief himself didn’t seem to mind that I was speaking informally.
‘Anyway…’

It was a modest house.
What looked like work clothes were hanging on a coat rack, and the interior had almost no decorations except for furniture necessary for daily life.
They say you can see a person’s character by looking at the state of their house.
I feel like I have a rough idea of what kind of personality the village chief has.

“What is it that you wanted to talk about…”
The village chief, who sat down after Saya and I had taken our seats, cautiously addressed me.
He still looked very tense.
…I think I should address this first.

“Relax. I have no intention of killing you. No, not any of the villagers here either.”
“Is… is that really true..?”
“Of course. I’ll swear on my mana.”
Why would I kill you? I’m not a psychopath who enjoys slaughter.

In this world, for a magician to swear on their mana means to stake their honor.
Understanding the meaning of those words, the village chief’s face visibly brightened.
Was he that scared?

“Anyway, despite some unpleasant incidents, the reason I came here is because I want to clear up misunderstandings.”
“Misunderstandings… you say?”
“Yes. The misunderstanding that I brought misfortune to the village.”
There were many other things I wanted to ask, but it seemed I should start with that first.

“I see…”
I told the village chief about what had happened.

It was true that I caused the fire and flood in the village, but it wasn’t intentional; it was an accident that occurred while I was eliminating magical beasts.
Also, because of the adventurer he sent, Saya, who was living with me, was almost in danger, and the adventurer was eaten by a magical beast.

The village chief, after hearing my story, initially had a half-doubting expression, but then nodded as if he understood.
“Come to think of it, since the witch came, there have been many young villagers who found the corpses of magical beasts in the mountains…”
“…They probably saw the corpses of the magical beasts I killed.”

The reason I didn’t clean up the corpses was simply because it was bothersome.
“That means… you’ve been protecting our village all this time….”
“I guess that’s how it turned out.”

Actually, the reason I periodically cleared out the magical beasts wasn’t for the safety of the village, but because the magical beasts kept targeting the vegetable garden I was growing behind my house.
Sometimes, not knowing the truth can be happier.

“……”
Looking at the village chief’s face, he seemed to have a lot he wanted to say.
He probably doesn’t disbelieve what I’ve said so far, but there must be something else he wants to say.
But it seems he’s hesitating because it’s difficult to put into words.

‘I can guess roughly.’
The words of the villager who grabbed my collar.
“Give back my child that you took!!!!!!!”
When that woman said those words to me, the surrounding villagers seemed to implicitly agree.
─In other words, for some reason, there’s a perception spread among people that I kidnapped children.

“…Village chief. No, it was Galles, right? Anyway, I heard something concerning after I came here.”
“What might that be…”
“The villager who grabbed my collar said… to return the child I took.”
“…Isn’t it true?”

Undisguised hostility seeped through the village chief’s words.
Eyes that seemed to say─You did do it, didn’t you?
“I don’t know why such a story came about, but it’s the most absurd thing I’ve ever heard in my life.”
“But…… There’s a villager who says they saw you taking children.”

I was struck speechless by the village chief’s words, which made my common sense fly all the way to Andromeda.
What on earth is he talking about? I haven’t come down to this village since the day of the accident when I first burned the village.

“I can assure you, I haven’t come down to this village even once since the day I accidentally burned the village. How could I have kidnapped anyone?”
“…Is that really true?”
“If it’s a lie, you can take all my mana. Shall I perform a contract magic? Wait.”

“Th-that’s fine! We… we can just bring the young villager who said he saw the witch taking the children… Please wait a moment!”
Soon, the village chief hurriedly left, leaving me and Saya behind.
He probably went to bring the guy who said he saw me kidnapping children. I’d like to see his face in person.
Let’s see if he can say such things in front of me.

“Ariel. What is… kidnapping?”
“Huh?”
Saya, probably not knowing the difficult word ‘kidnapping’, asked me the meaning of the word.
How should I explain this…

“Um… Kidnapping is. Taking someone away without their consent.”
“Even if… that person doesn’t like it?”
“That’s right.”
After I briefly explained what kidnapping was, Saya got up from her chair and slowly approached me.
“Saya?”

And Saya gently sat on my lap. Did she want to be pampered?
I’m a bit worried, thinking that she might be mentally burdened because of what happened today.
Even though Saya completely entrusted her body to me, I didn’t feel much weight on my lap.
‘…She’s very light.’

While I was seriously considering whether I should increase Saya’s food portions, Saya suddenly said to me.
“Ariel.. doesn’t do things like kidnapping. Not a witch either. Ariel is kind!”
Saya’s words, overflowing with trust in me.
Hearing those words made a part of my heart swell.

…Could it be that she thinks I was disheartened by the villagers’ words and is trying to comfort me?
Thinking that, the weight I feel on my lap feels more reassuring than anything else.
Although we’ve only known each other for just over a week, this lovely child seems to have taken quite a liking to me.

“Ariel… are you crying?”

I was so grateful for this small child who believes in me that my eyes unconsciously turned red.
There’s nothing more undignified than crying in front of a child…
“Thank you… Saya.”
“Ugh.. can’t breathe Ariel…”
Who told you to be so adorable.

.
.
.

“I’m sorry… Saya…”
Perhaps I hugged her too tightly, Saya got off my lap and fled to a chair far away from me.
“Ariel… I hate you.”

Saya, puffing her cheeks to show her dissatisfaction, is angry at me. Of course, even that appearance is cute.
It’s because you were so adorable! It’s your fault!

Creak.
Just as I was trying to appease Saya’s anger, I heard the sound of the door opening.
It was the owner of this house, the village chief.
If there was anything strange, it was that he said he would bring the person who claimed to have seen me kidnapping children, but he came alone.

The village chief bowed his head deeply as he saw me.
“I… I’m sorry for keeping you waiting for so long.”
“That doesn’t matter… but why are you alone?”
The village chief carefully answered my question with a trembling voice.
“He… he’s disappeared.”

“What? Didn’t he just go somewhere?”
It was a question that came from thinking he might have just stepped out for a moment, but the village chief shook his head as if that wasn’t the case.
“No… when I went to Cain’s house.. it was completely empty. All the valuable items were taken. He was definitely there until this morning…”

…Something smells fishy.
“Is this Cain the one who said he saw me kidnapping children?”
“Yes. That’s right..”
“First, explain about this kidnapping incident. When did the kidnappings start happening in this village, and also tell me about this Cain guy.”

The village chief began to tell me about the disappearance cases that occurred in the village.

“…Not long after you first came to our village, young children in the village started to disappear.”

‘When I first came to the village… that was about 3 months ago.’
“At first, we thought, sadly, that children playing late at night might have been eaten by magical beasts. Such incidents, though rare, were not without precedent in rural villages like this.”

“…It wasn’t just one child who disappeared?”
“That’s right. So far, more than ten children have gone missing….”
The village chief was biting his lip hard, as if it was painful to mention the missing children.

“Just as we were starting to feel something was strange about the continuous disappearances of children, a young villager named Cain came to see me.”
“And this Cain guy said he saw me taking the children?”

Nod.
The village chief nodded at my words.

“Tell me more about this Cain guy.”
“…Cain is an outsider who came to our village about 2 years ago. At first, we wondered why he came to a village like this, but since Cain was so polite and friendly, he quickly blended into the village.”

A polite and friendly young outsider. Good enough at socializing to quickly blend into the village─is it?
“I’m sorry to say this, but just as we were suspecting you as the culprit of the disappearances, when we heard Cain’s words, we believed them without any doubt.”

Why did that guy spread malicious rumors about me?
…The answer wasn’t hard to guess.
“No way… Cain did such a thing…”
From the way he’s speaking, it seems the village chief has also roughly figured it out.

In my previous life, there was a game I enjoyed called the Mafia game.
It’s a game where you find the murderer, the mafia, who pretends to be a citizen among many citizens. At first, no prior information is given, so people start reasoning by suspecting each other of being the mafia.

As you play this game, there inevitably comes a point when the mafia starts to be suspected by other citizens, and at that time, the action the mafia takes is predetermined.
That is─
‘─To frame another citizen as the mafia and shift the suspicion onto them.’

This mafia guy, no, Cain, clearly told such a lie with the intention of framing me as the mafia.
“It seems he ran away as soon as he saw me coming to the village… We need to find this Cain guy.”